It appears that, when it became necessary to inform the Turkish ministers of the projected treaty, they one and all evinced the greatest repugnance to the idea of an alliance with their hereditary enemies. But, at the news that the British fleet was approaching the Dardanelles, they withdrew their objections. They had besought the British government for naval assistance in the struggle with Mehemet Ali, and their request had been refused. The arrival, on June 25, in the Bay of Tenedos of Sir Pulteney Malcolm's squadron, which, a few months earlier, could have intercepted the communications with Egypt and changed the course of the campaign, now only served to revive painful recollections of Admiral Duckworth's proceedings in 1807.[311] The question of access to the sea, which bathes the coasts of the richest provinces of the Empire, must necessarily be a matter of the highest importance to Russia. The principle of regarding the Black Sea as a _mare clausum_ found a place in the treaty concluded between the Porte and Russia, on December 23, 1798. It was again inserted into the treaty of September 23, 1805, but with this important addition--that to the Russian fleet was granted a right of passage to the Mediterranean through the straits. These conditions, however, had been terminated by the outbreak of hostilities in 1806, and in the subsequent treaty of peace, signed at Bucharest on May 10, 1812, no mention was made of the special privilege which Russia had obtained seven years before. Again in the treaty of peace concluded between Great Britain and Turkey, on January 5, 1809, England undertook to observe "the ancient rule of the Ottoman Empire," which declared the straits of Constantinople closed to the warships of the Powers. But this arrangement, which had ever since been regarded as a law of nations, was suddenly terminated by the act, signed at the palace of Unkiar-Skelessi, restoring Russia to the favoured position which she had enjoyed for a brief space of time in 1805. No specific mention, it was true, had been made of her right of passage to and from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. Nevertheless, although for obvious reasons both Russian and Turkish ministers might prefer to elude a direct statement on the subject, they unquestionably placed this interpretation upon Orloff's treaty.[312] It was in this light also that it was looked upon by Lord Palmerston and the Duc de Broglie.